It was almost oh-one-hundred and Detective Chief Inspector Robert Crane of the Criminal Investigation Department and his assistant, Detective Sergeant Sally Jones, sat in plainclothes in an unmarked vehicle across the road from the Park End club, the domain of the Park End gang. They had received a tip off that a known criminal was frequenting the club. They were keeping it under observation and had been doing so for almost two hours.

“Sir,” Sally Jones said tentatively.

“What is it, Sergeant?”

“How much longer are we going to wait?”

Crane glared at her in annoyance and said sarcastically, “What’s the matter, Jones? Are you getting bored?”

Sally shook her head. “No, sir, I…err, I need a pee, that’s all.”

Crane wondered why the Superintendent had it in for him by giving him a bloody woman for an assistant. There were any number of good, male detective sergeants available and he could have had any one of those, but no, they had to assign him a woman, of all people. “For God’s sake, Jones, can’t you hold onto your bladder for a little while?”

“Sorry, sir, but I really do need to go.”

Crane sighed resignedly. “Well, go into the damn club.”

“What?”

“There’s a bloody club there, Jones, across the road—they will have facilities, go in there. Just don’t look too much like a bloody cop.”

She grinned and opened the car door. “Right, sir, won’t be a tick.”

Heaven help us, Crane thought as he watched Jones’s shapely bottom, emphasised by her short tight skirt, swaying from side to side sensuously as she walked quickly across the road. He kept his eyes on her until she passed by the bouncer and disappeared through the club doors. Still, it could have been worse—they could have given him that fat Sergeant, Barbara Ford. He shuddered at the thought, because she would have made his life intolerable. At least Jones is nice to look at, he thought somewhat guiltily.

A few minutes later, Sergeant Jones was striding across the road toward him. He admired the way her breasts bounced and swayed beneath her blouse. He sighed as he wondered if he would have been better off with Sergeant Ford, after all. At least her fat body would not give him the erotic thoughts he often had about Jones. Damn it. He scowled. I’m old enough to be her father. In addition, he was bloody married, and happily at that.

Jones opened the door and leant into the car. “Perhaps you should come and see inside the club, sir. There is a group of undesirables gathering. It looks like they might be having a meeting of some kind.”

“Is our target there?”

Sally shook her head. “No, sir. At least I don’t think so. Anyway, I didn’t see him.”

Crane scowled impatiently. “Well, who is there, Jones?”

Sally flushed. “There’s Jake Nosey Parsons and Baldy Burroughs. There are two others, a bit rough looking characters, but I don’t recognise them. Perhaps we should go in and get us a drink so you can see them for yourself, sir.”

Crane licked his dry lips and admitted that he could do with a drink. His throat was parched and he’d had enough of the bottled water they’d brought with them. A cold beer would go down quite nicely. He got out of the vehicle and threw his jacket and tie onto the rear seat. “Come on then, Jones. Loosen a button or two so we look like punters, not cops.”

“Right, sir,” Sally said enthusiastically as she undid some blouse buttons a mite lower than Crane’s blood pressure could stand. Her breasts, pressed together by her arms, swelled alarmingly in the deep vee of her blouse, and he began to wish he were twenty years younger.

He gulped. “Damn it Jones, don’t you have a bloody bra on?”

“No, sir, sorry, sir. If it bothers you, I can do the buttons up again.”

Gruffly, to cover up what her breasts were doing to his libido, he said, “It doesn’t matter, Jones, let’s go and get us that drink.”

It was not very busy in the club where a few women, some with a male friend, some with another woman, were dancing on the small dance floor. The swirling lights were nauseating as they constantly flashed and changed colour and dazzling when they flashed across their eyes. They had no trouble get the attention of the barman. “What do you drink, Jones?”